This week, Google announced a change aimed at enhancing the relevance of Search ads displayed lower on the results page. Previously, ads from the same advertiser were typically confined to a single ad location per page. However, after observing user behaviour, Google found that users often scroll past top results to review content lower down the page and may return to the top if they find more relevant content.
To improve user experience and ad relevance, Google will now allow ads from advertisers who appeared in top positions to also participate in the auction at the bottom of the page. This change aims to display more relevant ads to users as they scroll, potentially increasing engagement and conversions.
Google says “This means that a user scrolling lower down the page might see a highly relevant ad from the same advertiser, but not necessarily the exact same content that they saw earlier.“
It’s important to note that this update does not alter Google’s policy on double serving for Search Ads. Advertisers will not bid against themselves within a single ad location, and the existing unfair advantage policy remains in effect.
How does Google explain the impact on advertisers?
When asked about the impact of the change, Google says:
“This change, which will provide more opportunities for relevant search ads at the bottom of the page, may impact your overall metrics. To understand the impact on your campaigns, we recommend that you segment your metrics by ‘Top versus other’ if you’re interested in understanding performance for different ad locations. The search terms report will continue to show query-level clicks, whether your ads are clicked on in top or bottom locations.“
Google also continues to push the importance of ensuring keywords, ad copy, and landing pages are well aligned with user search intent to take advantage of these additional opportunities.
Basically, Google is saying that advertisers need to continue doing what they’ve been doing. Ad campaigns should focus on the user journey, considering what a user would want to see in an ad and on a landing page, based on the search query they’ve used. What is likely to attract them to click, and ultimately convert? And Google may show an ad twice on a single results page to try and increase the chances of catching that user in the right moment.
How does this really impact advertisers?
The truth is we don’t yet know.
What I don’t understand is, how do we know the impact of ads appearing at the top and bottom of the same search engine results page (SERP)? And how is it going to impact average CPCs and number of impressions? We already know that click costs are rising fast (for more information on this see: https://searchengineland.com/cpc-inflation-google-ads-costs-rising-fast-454291).
Also, surely each ad could now appear twice per search query so could we see impressions potentially double? And who gets chosen to appear twice? In tests that I’ve done, I’ve sometimes seen the same results at the top and bottom (same advertisers, not same ads) and sometimes the list has been different.
So many questions that I don’t feel we (or Google) can answer yet. It’s something we’ll have to monitor closely before we get a sense of the impact, and it’s likely that Google will give us as little transparency as possible.
For some advertisers this could be a good thing, but not for those that aren’t chosen to appear twice.
What are your thoughts?
